


You don't summon a demon for that

by Rackabone



Category: Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Bullying, Caring Crowley (Good Omens), Demon Summoning, Original Character(s), Other, Post-Canon, Protective Crowley (Good Omens), Suicidal Thoughts, Summoning, Summoning Circles, Worried Aziraphale (Good Omens)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-08
Updated: 2021-02-08
Packaged: 2021-03-13 21:28:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,922
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29285289
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rackabone/pseuds/Rackabone
Summary: Crowley was really pissed when he got summoned shortly after waking up. Until he notized that this time, it was different - There were no people in ridiculous robes, for a start
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 5
Kudos: 40





	You don't summon a demon for that

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first Fanfic, although not my first attempt at writing something. Hope you enjoy :)
> 
> English isn't my first language, so please ignore any mistakes :)
> 
> I got the idea after reading many storeis where Crowley is summoned, but it took a while to work it out. Parts of it is from my own experience.
> 
> Edit: Thank you for all your kudos!

To say that Crowley was pissed would be an understatement. He had had _plans._ He had just gotten up from a little nap and was on his way to yell at the plants before meeting with Aziraphale in the evening for dinner.

But as soon as he got out of bed, he had felt the tale-tell sings of a summoning and now he was _here._

When he opened his eyes and looked around, he had to admit that this was strange. Normally he was summoned in basements, on graveyards, in old buildings, and anywhere else where it felt _spooky_. This time though, he seemed to have ended up in a normal apartment. Apart from the circle in which he stood, there were several stacks of books and boxes – all in all it looked like someone was in the middle of moving in or out.

While he took in his surroundings, he searched for his summoners, but there was a disquieting lack of people in ridiculous robes. There was _nobody_. Or, to be precise, there was nobody until he looked down.

Someone was sitting nearly two meters away from the circle, looking at the demon with an expression of something like fear, but not quiet. Crowley couldn’t tell how old the person was or indeed whether they were male or female. The human had short dark hair, eyes that seemed a bit too large for the face, and looked a bit on the skinny side, especially with those baggy clothes on.

“Well, congratiolations, you summoned me. What do you want?” Crowley asked, sounding a bit annoyed when the human just stared.

That seemed to shake the person out of their trance and they started writing on a small notepad.

 _That’s... interesting_ , Crowley thought. “Can you hear me?” he asked. He didn’t know what to do if the summoner turned out to be deaf. (While he could make himself being heard inside the head of humans, it wouldn’t work the other way round.)

They hold up the notepad and Crowley read ‘Can you make them not care?’

 _If this continues like_ that _, it’s going to take a while_.

“Who are _they_?”

‘My parents. My friends. People’

Crowley frowned. Normally, humans want other humans to care for them and about them. Normally, humans don’t summon demons to stop that. Rather the opposite.

He let his gaze wander around the room again, noticing small notes taped to the stacks and boxes around them. They read ‘Linda’, ‘John’, ‘Charity’ and ‘Parents’. He got the feeling that something was _wrong_ here, he just couldn’t point a finger on _what_ exactly it was. Frustrated, he sat down, now nearly at eye-level with this human. “I don’t understand. Why do you want them to stop caring? Why don’t you tell me your name, hm? I’m Crowley.”

‘Nemo. You wouldn’t understand. I just need them to stop.’

Reading this, Crowley suddenly got the feeling that he knew exactly, _what_ Nemo meant. And he was certain that Nemo was not their real name, in his imagination no parent would name their child “Nobody”.

“Summoning a demon is a bit extreme, don’t you think? There are hotlines, the people there can help you way more.”

‘NO’

“Why not?”

‘I don’t like talking to people. They don’t listen. They never do. And I’m just so tired.’

“I could help you sleep.”

‘That’s not what I meant. I just don’t want to have to function any more.’

 _Shit_ , Crowley thought, a cold feeling coursing through his body. He wasn’t good at this, Aziraphale was way better with humans. But Aziraphale was currently in his bookshop, possibly reading Wilde again and Crowley didn’t want to leave Nemo alone just now, even if he could, which he couldn’t, him being inside a summoning and holding circle.

“Do your friends know about this? Or your parents? Have you told them about how you feel?”

‘My parents never notice. And I don’t want to be a burden to my friends. They shouldn’t have to worry about me, I don’t want to hurt them.’

“And you think that they wouldn’t be hurt if you just up and left? _Honestly_ , Nemo, that doesn’t make sense.”

‘That’s why I drew this circle. I want them not to care because then they won’t be hurt.’

Crowley looked down, because he didn’t want Nemo to see the frustration in his eyes. Sometimes he had met people like Nemo. They usually were the ones who cared for others the most and then just disappeared and everyone around them would be devastated when the body was found.

He blinked when he heard Nemo scribbling on the notepad, his gaze focusing on his watch.

‘I’m keeping you from something important, don’t I?’

She had noticed him glancing at his watch. “No, it’s not that, I don’t have any plans right now.” Partly true. He hadn’t glanced at his watch, he had looked through it. And there was still some time before he was supposed to meet Aziraphael.

‘It’s okay if you can’t help. You can just leave.’

“Wait, _what?_ First, I didn’t say I can’t help. And second, I can’t just _leave_ , I’m in a _summoning_ circle and you drew spells for _holding_ around it!”

‘Only for the first question. They should be gone now.’

Crowley looked at the signs surrounding the circle again, this time more careful. Nemo was right, the holding spells were ineffective by now. As he looked even closer he noticed that _all_ the spells were ineffective now. He really should have noticed sooner, but he was preoccupied with the strangeness of it all. “I really want to help you, Nemo, but I don’t think that what you ask for would be right.”

He also noticed that it hadn’t been a summoning for _him_ in particular. Those had been rare even before the whole world-not-ending, ever since he had changed his name. If humans didn’t try to summon the Serpent of Eden, they could chant and howl all they liked, Crowley had no obligation to show up. But that wasn’t what had happened here. Instead of being focused on a particular occult entity, the summoning call had gone out to _any_ entity in the surrounding area listening, which meant that Crowley had just been the first to respond, probably because his defences where down as he was nearly asleep when the summoning started. Aziraphael either hadn’t noticed or had special protection in his bookshop. Surrounding the circle were books, opened at some pages. Crowley saw that some of them where occult tomes on the subject of Summoning (of course, how else would Nemo had been able to get him here), but others were what looked like school books on Latin. They really had thought it through.

Nemo hit the notepad with their palm while clenching the pen so hard it nearly broke, frustration clearly visible in their crunched-up face. Crowley noticed a few tears slipping down their cheeks. They pulled at their too-short hair and opened their mouth as if to scream, but no sound came out.

“Whoa, easy. Calm down. What’s wrong?” Crowley was really worried now and he somehow had managed to upset them, which was counterproductive. He needed them to trust him at least a little bit in order to help them.

It took a long time, but gradually Nemo seemed to become calmer again. Finally ‘Sometimes there are so many words in my head and I don’t know how to get them out and it hurts.’

“I think, I need more information. You don’t have to write it down, there is a simpler way. But I will have to touch you a bit for it to work. Would that be okay?”

‘How? Where?’

“It’s a bit like reading someone’s mind, I guess. Your hand would be the easiest, I suppose.” The last sentence almost sounded like a question. While not strictly necessary, physical contact would make it easier for Crowley to gain access to Nemo’s thoughts and to some extend their memory. And perhaps the physical contact would help them too.

They hadn’t asked whether it would hurt. It would not, but this lack of concern regarding pain was making Crowley wanting to hug this person until they were all right, though he knew that it would take more than a hug – no matter who or what the hugger was – to help Nemo getting better.

Slowly, tentatively, Nemo held one hand out for him as if to shake. Equally slowly, Crowley reached for it. He moved extremely careful, partly because he didn’t want to scare Nemo and partly because he had to cross the lines of the circle to get hold of the hand and he wasn’t completely certain that there wouldn’t be any obstacles.

Crossing the line felt a bit like moving through a sheet of water. Not really unpleasant, but noticeable.

Crowley maintained eye contact with Nemo while he moved towards them, trying to will them more relaxed. The closer he got, the more he could see how tense Nemo looked and how skinny. It almost reminded him of his reflection – bare his red hair and his snakelike eyes. Which reminded him, he wasn’t wearing his shades and still Nemo didn’t seem to be afraid. On the other hand, he had told them he was a demon, so maybe they just didn’t mind.

He let out an involuntary hiss shortly after he made contact with Nemo’s hand and started looking into their mind. Nemo tensed up even more and Crowley wanted to say that it was okay, that he wasn’t hurt, but he was too caught up in the influx of information to do more than keep looking at their face.

There were some bright spots, images of reading, of looking at the ocean and hearing the waves, of gazing up at the stars at night after carefully arranging the body so that the head pointed due north, of sitting next to other humans (Linda and John, Nemo’s mind supplied) and watching a movie or talking while drinking tea. But mostly there were the feelings of loneliness, of not fitting in, of hurt. Crowley watched in first perspective as other humans were pushing and shouting at Nemo, once he noticed something being thrown in their general direction...

The sound of silent crying made him focus his gaze again. Nemo was shaking, curled in on themselves, only their hand stretched out. Without thinking about it, Crowley let go of the hand and instead wrapped his arms around Nemo, not reading Nemo’s mind any more, he just tried to calm them down a bit. The silent crying turned into gut-wrenching sobs with the increased contact, while the shaking increased to a point where Crowley felt like he was hugging an earthquake. “Shh, it’s okay,” he murmured and noticed that he was crying as well. He had of course known for centuries that humans were capable of being worse than the worst demons in Hell, but having evidence of it still managed to shock him.

Nemo seemed to cry for ages while Crowley held them and murmured what he hoped were comforting words. He didn’t know what else to do without letting go of them and he suspected that that would not make the situation better, even if it resulted in getting some tea for Nemo. Eventually the crying and shaking stopped and their breathing became slower and calmer. Crowley realized that they had fallen asleep in his arms. It was the first time since the Flood that a human – child or otherwise – had fallen asleep while being held by him. He pushed the memory of the Flood back as hard as he could, not wanting to think about all the people he hadn’t been able to save. He _would_ save this person, although the _how_ wasn’t quite figured out yet.

The memories started flooding Crowley again then, more intense than before. He witnessed standing at the edge of tall buildings, always securely behind the railing but calculating whether the height would be enough to be dead on impact. Lying awake at night because the information of different poisons was racing through his mind. Noticing other people starting to worry and acting as if nothing was wrong until the others were satisfied. Biting down hard on the tongue in order not to break down while other people could witness. Formulating a Will. Answering “good” automatically on the question “How are you” when in conversation but typing and deleting honest paragraphs when being asked the same question while chatting on the internet... Crowley broke the mental connection then, realising that it wouldn’t do any good to either of them if he kept it up.

Taking advantage of the fact that Nemo was asleep, Crowley mentally checked for any physical wounds (he wouldn’t be able to heal them directly, but he could miracle them bandaged), noticing that Nemo was female while doing so. There were no permanent damages, no scars to show for the struggle this girl was going through but there were bruises in easy to hide locations and a dull ache from hunger and cold. The flat was in fact quite warm but Crowley supposed that the lack of food meant that Nemo’s corporation had a harder time to maintain body heat.

He got up with Nemo still in his arms and looked for a blanket or something alike which he could use to provide more heat for the girl, but ended up miracling one into existence when his search was fruitless. On a table he noticed a little box with no note stuck to it, obviously Nemo either didn’t want anybody to have it or thought that nobody would want to have it. It contained an old stuffed animal, presumably an elephant (although it was made out of blue and green cloth) and some books which were on the brink of falling apart due to extensive reading. The things inside that box felt somehow very important, more important than the rest of the apartment. _It’ll have to go wherever Nemo is about to go_ , Crowley decided. Maybe it would help. And her notepad, she didn’t seem to want to talk very much.

That left the question of what to do now. He wouldn’t leave her here, that was obvious, and he didn’t want to leave her with strangers at the hospital. So he was left with either his apartment or Aziraphael’s bookshop.

From what he had gathered in her memory and the lonely box, she seemed to like books and he was meant to meet the angel anyway, therefore the bookshop it would be. With that thought he miracle the box to the bookshop, and after seeing that he should have met with Aziraphael an hour ago, he added a note stating that Aziraphael should not worry, he was fine and would be in the bookshop as well soon.

Crowley checked the rest of the apartment for anything important Nemo might need while he carried her with him. The other rooms – a small bedroom, a kitchen and a bathroom – were nearly exact duplicates of the room he was summoned in, just stacks and boxes of things with dedications, even her wardrobe was empty. Everything was clean, Nemo must have spent hours just getting the place spotless. He shuddered again.

Crowley was sure that there was nothing left in the apartment that would be immediately needed by Nemo but he also thought it would be wise to be able to get all her stuff later. Since he hadn’t enough space at his apartment to store everything this girl owned he just sealed the flat so nobody would enter or in fact notice it was there.

The only thing left now was for him and Nemo to get to Aziraphael, who Crowley desperately hoped wasn’t too annoyed with him being late. So, with a snap of his fingers, Crowley transported both of them to his angel.

* * *

“Crowley! What on Earth- Do you even realize, how _worried_ I was?!”

Yes, Aziraphael was pretty furious. _Well_ , Crowley thought, _at least I have the perfect explanation_.

“I mean, you are an _hour_ late for our dinner, you didn’t answer your phone, you weren’t in your flat...” Aziraphael was coming from the back room into the main part of the shop where Crowley had materialized, ranting as if he was checking things of a mental complains list. “And then you send a box here with a stuffed animal, some poor old books, a notepad and a note from you telling me _not to worry_!” His voice got louder as he kept complaining so that when he stopped, two meters away from Crowley, he was nearly shouting at the top of his lungs.

“Angel, I get that you are furious and I’m really, _really_ sorry, but could you please keep your voice down a bit?” Nemo had started cringing and tensing up at the noise and Crowley didn’t want the first thing for her to see upon waking be an angry Principality. Well, the first thing for her to see upon waking would currently be Crowley’s shoulder, but the first thing after _that_ would be an angry Principality.

Finally, Aziraphael stopped voicing his frustration and looked at his demon. “Who- Crowley, why- _What happened_?” His expression moved from angry through alarmed and confused to settle on concerned.

“ _That_ is a long story,” Crowley said while moving slowly towards the back room, a comfy couch, and some alcohol. He definitely could do with some alcohol after this.


End file.
